Japanese teens go crazy for Gackt-o! Gackt-o! at his Saitama Arena concert in Tokyo! La Carmina and friends report on the live experience – cosplayers, merchandise, screaming girls – at Gackt’s “Requiem et Reminiscence II” show on July 11, 2009. Watch the video below; I guarantee you’ll burst out laughing.

(We were at the noisy Electric Town subway exit, so if you can’t hear all the words, there is a transcription below. Check out this and this post for more photos of concert-goers.)

(Lauren filmed the video; you can hear her cracking up at times. Here we are at the Akihabara 7-Eleven prior to visiting the drag maid cafe, Hibari-tei, which you can see in my Theme Restaurants book.)

JAPANESE TEEN GIRLS: Gackto! Gackto!
CARMINA: Hi, it’s La Carmina! I’m in Akihabara with…
SEBASTIEN: Sebastien!
CARMINA: I’m wearing the skimpiest maid outfit possible. I think it’s based on an anime character’s outfit but I don’t know.
SEBASTIEN: I don’t know either.
CARMINA: Yeah, we’re not otaku enough.
SEBASTIEN: And you bought it for someone special.
CARMINA: I did not! Shhh!
SEBASTIEN: Oh, sorry.
CARMINA: I did not buy it for someone special, shhh! Anyway… we’re going to talk about the Gackt concert.
SEBASTIEN: YES!
CARMINA: You weren’t there! But we’re going to talk about it. It was quite the experience. I got last minute tickets from my friend, Count de Sang. He called me up and I had 15 minutes to get ready. So I quickly put something on, ran to the station, and we headed off to Saitama Arena. On the subway, we saw all sorts of girls… Lolitas, girls holding Gackt bags and wearing the T-shirts… they were obviously on the way to the concert. Every time we got lost, we’d follow the Lolitas. We got there, and there were girls all over the place – cosplayers, who did some really good outfits, Gackt from different eras… The military look that he currently has is extremely hot. He has the red arm band, the military jacket; it’s very Nazi-like. We lined up for merchandise… did you see the pictures?
SEBASTIEN: Of the flag?
CARMINA: Yes, that’s right! There was a red flag. The cat paws were sold out. Rowr.
SEBASTIEN: Were there cat paws too?
CARMINA: There were cat paws! Because in every Gackt concert, he features cute little kitties. They go, wah wah wah wahhh. And you wave the cat paws.
(Cats waving)

CARMINA: He started with the song Jesus…
(Gackt performing Jesus)
SEBASTIEN: My Personal Jesus?
CARMINA: No! Visual Kei Jesus!
SEBASTIEN: Oh, sorry.
CARMINA: The thing is, you’re not a girl.
SEBASTIEN: No.
CARMINA: And you’re not a teenager.
SEBASTIEN: That’s right.
CARMINA: You have to be a teenage girl to fully appreciate Gackt-O! We almost lost our hearing because these girls were screaming, GACKT-O!!!!
(Japanese teen girls screaming)
CARMINA: The concert was 4+ hours and the entire time, they were screaming in our ears. I think we lost hearing after a while.
SEBASTIEN: Heh heh.
CARMINA: Yeah, you would have loved it.
CARMINA: Gackt always does a call and answer where he goes Wah wah wahh! And the girls go Wah wah wahh!
(Gackt yelling)
CARMINA: Or he’ll say Okaeri! And they’ll go, Tadaima! Okaeri! …
SEBASTIEN: … tadaima?
CARMINA: Right, exactly.
SEBASTIEN: Sounds very exciting.
CARMINA: It was exciting for ten minutes. But then the screaming… and I’m not exaggerating a jot here. It went on for over an hour.
(Gackt screaming)
CARMINA: So the screaming went on and on. Finally, he launched into song again, and I must say, he is a fantastic performer. He has a voice that carries, he’s so alive on stage…
(Gackt performing)
CARMINA: The concert ended with the movie; it didn’t really make sense. My friend Yukiro hated it…
YUKIRO: It was really really terrible. Much worse than I could have ever expected.
CARMINA: Why? What was so bad?
YUKIRO: I mean, the worst part was that he screamed at the audience for over one hour…
(Gackt screaming)
YUKIRO: All of a sudden it turned really really bad. He switches his clothes to some junky style and it was so terrible, the music went from the top to the bottom. Yuck!
CARMINA: And how about the movie at the end?
YUKIRO: It was pathetic. We laughed so hard. The worse part is that I can’t even hate it because some parts of the concert were so good.
(Gackt performing)
YUKIRO: It wasn’t all bad but it was way too long.
CARMINA: Now we’re off to a drag maid café.
SEBASTIEN: Yeah? Ok.
CARMINA: So we’re off. Bye bye.
JAPANESE TEENS: Gackt-O!